Everything New in iOS 26.5 Beta 1:

iOS 26.5 is now available for developers, and while it doesn’t include any new Siri capabilities, there are some major changes for the European Union, and smaller tweaks for features available worldwide.

A meagre release, except for the EU. I find it stupid that Apple doesn’t enable the same feature set in the Americas market. Apple being… Apple.

Apple is sure to release iOS 26.5 beta, when is still an unknown, but also unknown is what Apple Intelligence/ Siri new features Apple will want users to test that cannot wait iOS 27. 👀 We shall see very soon.

9to5Mac’s article “Vibe coding could mark the end of the App Store review process as we know it”:

Summary

The rise of AI-powered “agentic coding” has overwhelmed Apple’s App Store review process, with developers reporting review times of 3+ days to a week instead of the traditional under-24-hour turnaround. The influx of fully AI-generated apps from new developers has created a bottleneck for human reviewers, making it unfair for established developers whose update submissions are delayed. To address this, the author suggests Apple could implement separate review queues for established developers or automate updates while maintaining human review only for new submissions, though it may ultimately become necessary to reduce or eliminate full human review.

I don’t see the current review process at Apple as sustainable. I can imagine parts of the current workflow being automated (like finding instances of private API usage in application binaries). But, just for vibe coding, reviewing app submissions should be human-gated. An AI agent could even run the app in a simulator for testing.

Daring Fireball commenting ‘How Apple Became Apple: The Definitive Oral History of the Company’s Earliest Days’

Apple is at its best when it’s infused with a bit of the spirit of the two Steves whose first joint venture were blue boxes that let you make long distance phone calls for free. The first public phone call Steve Jobs ever made on an iPhone was a prank call to the Starbucks next to Moscone West. I feel like that renegade spirit has been repressed in the Tim Cook era.

Indeed. Ternus could change that; that’s my expectation.

I wouldn’t be surprised to see Apple come up with Siri+ or to take a cut on third party AI offerings that support iOS 27 new AI-related features. I would probably plug my Claude AI subscription into this provided Anthropic support is enacted.

I officially lost my Apple Pencil Pro. This 200 CAN$ doesn’t support Find My??? WTF. This is the second time I’m losing an Apple Pencil. The first time was the original one.

Successful products — Manuel Moreale

A product being popular is an indication of a lot of people using it. Doesn’t necessarily mean that the product is good. Doesn’t necessarily mean it’s successful.

Exhibit A: all Microsoft 365 products, which contain so many paper cuts.